


Partners

by LittlebutFiery



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: F/M, Non-Pathfinder Ryder, Pre-Relationship, small au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-26 02:43:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13848396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittlebutFiery/pseuds/LittlebutFiery
Summary: Pathfinder Scott Ryder doesn't have time to investigate the Nilken Rensus case, so he assigns it to his sister Sara, newly awoken from her coma. She teams up with Tiran Kandros to investigate the case and romance blossoms.





	Partners

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ScientistSalarian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScientistSalarian/gifts).



Noise.

That was the first thing to seep into Sara’s awareness as she woke up.

Bustling footsteps, groans, soothing voices, beeping machines…

Where was she? The cryo bay was supposed to be quiet.

She opened her eyes and groaned. Everything was so bright and white and _painful_ ; she immediately squeezed her eyes shut again.

“She’s awake!” a voice cried.

Sara tried to turn over, but a gentle hand on her shoulder stopped her. A familiar voice said, “Easy, Sara. You’ve had a rough time of it. Let’s keep still for a bit.”

“Harry?” Sara managed weakly, voice rough from 600 years of disuse.

“Good. Her neural functions seem to be working properly,” Harry Carlyle said.

Sara opened her eyes again to see Harry’s face hovering above her. She mumbled, “What are you talking about?”

Scott appeared in her field of vision. “Hey, Sara. How are you feeling?”

“Like I got hit by a truck. Scott, what the hell is going on? Where am I?” Sara replied.

“There was an issue when they were waking you up from your cryo-sleep,” Scott explained. “You’ve been in a coma for a week.”

“No wonder my head hurts,” Sara said, slowly moving her arm so she could rub her forehead. “When will I be up for duty?”

“I’ll keep you under watch for 24 hours. After that, assuming you’ve shown no indications of anything wrong, I’ll release you to the Initiative for duty,” Harry said.

“I actually have an assignment for you,” Scott said. “I was hoping you’d be up for it.”

“Assignment?” Sara snorted, carefully sitting up. “Who died and made you in charge?”

Harry and Scott were oddly silent, before Scott reluctantly admitted, “Dad. We went on a mission on Habitat 7, and…he died. He made me Pathfinder.”

Sara swallowed the loss like a bitter pill, mind flickering through the things she’d lost with her father’s death. There had been an immense amount of tension between them before he died…and now it would never be resolved. All the arguments, the fighting…it was all gone, for better or worse.

She straightened and asked, “What’s the assignment?”

“We’ve already had a murder in Andromeda,” Scott sighed.

“Of course,” Sara scowled.

“A turian named Nilken Rensus was convicted of it. His wife is convinced that he’s innocent. I don’t have time to investigate, but I thought you might want to set things right,” Scott explained.

Sara contemplated this for a moment. She was more geared for fighting than police work, but it sounded like an intriguing assignment. She smiled up at her barely-older brother and said, “I’m in.”

“Good. Kandros’ll be happy,” Scott grinned.

“Kandros?” Sara asked.

“Tiran Kandros,” Scott said. “He’s the Nexus milita leader and director of security. He was the one that asked me to look into this.”

Sara nodded. Scott went on, “Once Harry clears you for duty, you can find him near Operations on the Nexus. He should be able to brief you.”

“Leave it to me,” Sara said. “I won’t let you down.”

“You never do,” Scott replied with a smile.

* * *

 The next 24 hours were the longest of Sara’s life, impatiently waiting to be cleared for duty. She had never been particularly good at waiting, not when duty called and excitement was waiting. She’d come to Andromeda for the adventure of a lifetime – a snag in the wake-up process wasn’t going to slow her down.

So the second Harry opened his mouth long enough for the word “cleared” to come out, Sara was gone, running from the med bay to the tram to the Nexus Operations Center.

She ran from the tram to the security headquarters, where Scott said Kandros would be, and came to a skidding, ungraceful halt at the door. A turian, tall even for his species, was standing with his back to her, engrossed in a data terminal. Sara asked breathlessly, “Tiran Kandros?”

The turian turned and said simply, “Yes?”

Sara froze. She’d met plenty of turians during all of the preparations for their departure from the Milky Way. They were interesting enough, attractive enough – she was something of a xenophile, she had to admit – but sweet God, she’d never heard one with a voice like _that_.

That single word made her completely lose her train of thought, engrossed as she was in that deep, rumbling voice.

Why the hell hadn’t Scott warned her? That bastard, he _knew_ how Sara would react. He wanted her to make a fool of herself.

Kandros raised a curious browplate and asked, “Is your translator broken, or did you just come to stare at me?”

“Um,” Sara managed intelligently.

“And here I thought humans were supposed to be eloquent,” Kandros chuckled.

“I’m Sara Ryder,” Sara finally said, relieved to have gotten a full sentence out. “Scott sent me.”

“Ah, the elusive Sara Ryder,” Kandros replied. “I’ve heard so much about you. Good to meet you.”

He held out a hand to shake, so Sara shook it, saying, “Scott didn’t say much, but he spoke highly of you. Said you and somebody named Kesh were the only people on the Nexus without their head up their ass.”

Kandros laughed boisterously. “I do my best. What can I do for you?”

“Scott mentioned the Nilken Rensus case,” Sara replied. “He wants me to look into it.”

“That damn case is going to haunt me till I die,” Kandros scowled, moving to another terminal and pulling up some information. “I blame Tann.”

“Tann?” Sara asked.

“Director Tann. Took over the Initiative after Jien Garson died,” Kandros replied. “He wanted a verdict on the case too quickly. The investigative work was shoddy at best.”

“That’s why Scott wants me to make it right,” Sara insisted. “Can you help?”

“I don’t know if you’ll find anything, but the full case file is right there,” Kandros took a step away from the terminal and gestured to it. “I’ll be at my desk if you need any help.”

Sara pored over the data file for the Rensus case, her frown only growing as she read through more and more contradictions and evidence of poor investigation. Kandros reluctantly gave her permission to speak to the witness as well as Tann on the matter.

He was just about to leave the office for the night when Sara returned, planting herself firmly in the doorway and saying, “Rensus’s conviction was a mistake.”

Kandros sighed heavily. “Somehow, I knew you were going to say that.”

Sara went on, “I have Director Tann’s permission to go investigate the crime scene on Eos. To see what really happened.”

“You can’t possibly expect me to let you do that,” Kandros scowled. “You’re non-military personnel. Eos is a high-risk area.”

“I’m going to go, whether you like it or not,” Sara argued.

“The Initiative has already lost one Ryder. We can’t afford to lose another one,” Kandros shook his head. “I’m going with you.”

Sara had opened her mouth to protest when Kandros’s words actually registered in her brain. She managed, “What?”

“You’re the Pathfinder’s sister. That makes you a top priority target for the kett and any other enemies. I’m going with you,” Kandros replied. “That’s final.”

Sara sighed before nodding. “I guess that makes us a team, then.”

Kandros nodded as well. “Guess so. Nice to meet you, partner.”

* * *

  _Sara is rather cute when she’s focused_.

Kandros blinked, wondering where the idle thought had come from. He had been watching her scan the ground around the crime scene for the better part of an hour while the sun beat down on them.

As attractive as the Pathfinder’s sister may be, Kandros was not inclined to help her search. The spirits-cursed Rensus case had given him his share of migraines and then some; the last thing he wanted to do was overthrow the verdict. He was here to protect Sara from wildlife and kett, and nothing more.

Plus, this way he got to enjoy her adorable thinking habits, her brow scrunched with focus, her lips pursed in a pout, her hands running repeatedly through her hair.

Kandros sighed. He really ought to be more professional. He was one of the leaders of the Initiative, an important colleague of Scott’s – he shouldn’t be admiring Sara’s shiny brown hair or clear blue eyes.

And yet, once the idea snuck into his mind, he couldn’t seem to shake it.

It took him an embarrassingly long time to stop thinking about this fact and realize that Sara had been returning to the same patch of sand over and over again, scanning it repeatedly, while her focused scowl only grew.

“Find anything?” Kandros asked.

“I think it’s a piece of armor,” Sara finally said. “SAM is having a hard time finding any usable DNA to see if it was Reynolds’ or not.”

She paused, cocking her head as though listening to a voice Kandros couldn’t hear. “SAM says he found something. The armor was Reynolds’.”

“Odd that a single piece of it would be all the way out here,” Kandros said.

“Scavengers must have gotten to Reynolds,” Sara frowned. She raised her arm, scanning for other pieces of Reynolds’ armor. “There’s another piece way over there. Let’s follow the trail.”

With this, Sara ran off, following the readings on her scanner. Kandros sighed, an argument to stay near the Nomad dying in his throat, before running after her.

Almost another hour later, the pair walked up to the sheer face of a rock formation standing tall in the middle of the desert. Sara was noticeably drooping with exhaustion from her first mission out of cryo; she was covered in a sheen of sweat and breathing heavily.

For his part, Kandros had been out of cryo much longer than she had, and he was just as winded and hotter than hell. It was all he could do to keep his tongue from lolling from his mouth like a Terran dog’s as he panted.

“Well…the trail leads here,” Sara said, after a brief silence. “Looks like there’s a small cave over there.”

“Hope you’re ready to get dirty. Eos’s scavengers are nasty little things. This is probably a kaerkyn nest, and they’re just disgusting,” Kandros replied. “You’re not squeamish, are you?”

Sara shook her head, so Kandros’ mandibles flared in a smile. “Good. They tend to explode when you shoot them. You’ll be cleaning bug guts off your armor for weeks.”

“Thanks for the heads-up,” Sara laughed, sounding a little nervous. Kandros frowned. He hadn’t meant to make her uncomfortable.

“We’ll be fine,” Kandros replied, hoping to boost her confidence. “I was the top shot in my class during basic.”

“So was I,” Sara grinned, leading the way into the kaerkyn nest.

Kandros followed her, raising his shotgun. The sounds in the darkness made his skin crawl, no matter how many times he heard them – the kaerkyn’s screeches, the scraping sound of their scales moving against each other, the clicking of their feet on the stone. Sara let out an involuntary whimper.

Their chest-mounted flashlights clicked on and she cried out at the undulating mass of creatures before them, raising her gun and shooting wildly. The kaerkyn shrieked and charged as one.

“Sara!” Kandros yelled, pulling the trigger on his gun and mowing down the creatures charging towards his partner.

She scrambled backwards, taking out kaerkyn with more carefully-placed shots as she came to stand beside Kandros. Together they took out the squirming horde, until the ground and the pair was covered in kaerkyn guts.

“Well,” Sara said, trying to shake the slime off her arms, “That was disgusting.”

“Told you,” Kandros chuckled. “Come on, let’s find whatever’s left of Reynolds so we can get back to the Nexus and get cleaned off.”

Sara nodded, holstering her gun and bringing her scanner back up. She stepped around the pools of goo, looking faintly revolted, as she led them deeper into the nest.

Kandros exchanged his shotgun for his pistol, finishing off any kaerkyn that had hidden from the initial onslaught while Sara stared at her scanner, brow once again furrowed in concentration.

They reached a dead end when the scanner pinged, indicating it had found something. Sara again listened for her SAM to speak before saying, “Reynolds’ omni-tool is over there. I…don’t know where the rest of him is.”

“I doubt there’s anything left to bury,” Kandros replied grimly.

Sara walked over to where the omni-tool was half-buried, brushing the dirt aside and picking it up. She asked aloud, “SAM? What can you tell us?”

She was quiet for a moment before gasping. Kandros demanded, “What?”

“Nilken’s shot wasn’t what killed Reynolds. The omni-tool bio-scans indicate he was killed with a shot to the back. But Nilken was facing him,” Sara said.

“So Rensus’s story was right. He was trying to kill a kett behind Reynolds and missed due to low visibility,” Kandros said, jaw clenched. “Fuck. This is the last thing we needed…no one is going to trust the Initiative leadership after this.”

“We can’t hide it!” Sara protested. “We have to make it right.”

“I didn’t say we were going to,” Kandros snapped. “Just that this is going to make my life hell for the foreseeable future.”

Sara was quiet for an even longer time before whispering, “Wait.”

“What?” Kandros asked.

“Repeat that, SAM,” Sara ordered.

Kandros waited for her to speak. “An audio recording on Reynolds’ omni-tool indicates that Rensus was trying to kill him. He just missed. A kett actually killed him.”

“So he _is_ guilty,” Kandros said, relieved.

“…technically, no,” Sara shook her head. “…we’ll have to decide this with Tann. I’m not sure how I feel about exiling a man for not actually killing someone.”

“Had the kett not done it, he would have,” Kandros argued. He sighed at the stubborn look Sara gave him. “We’ll figure it out later. Let’s get out of here before anything else tries to kill us.”

* * *

 Sara sighed heavily as they walked out of Tann’s office. “Well, that was a shitshow.”

Kandros laughed. “What else did you expect? It’s the Initiative.”

“I didn’t think it would be that hard to ask for a retrial,” Sara scowled. “We can still exile him for attempted murder. But exiling him from a crime he didn’t commit is wrong.”

“I’m just happy this is finally over,” Kandros replied. “This has been a pain in my ass since Reynolds died.”

Sara smiled up at him. “And here I thought you enjoyed working with me.”

“I didn’t say I didn’t,” Kandros retorted. “I prefer you to your brother.”

“I’m easier on the eyes, huh?” Sara asked, smirking. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you staring at me on Eos.”

Kandros choked on air, sputtering for a response. Sara laughed and went on, remembering his earlier words to her, “Is your translator broken, or did you just enjoy staring at me that much?”

He managed to restart his breathing and choke out, “I…um…sorry.”

“I guess you’ll have to make it up to me,” Sara said. “Maybe with dinner and drinks, say at Vortex tomorrow night?”

Kandros blinked. Was…was she asking what he thought she was asking?

She simply waited, a hand on her hip and a smirk on her face, until he dumbly asked, “Are you asking me on a date?”

“I guess you could say so,” Sara replied. “Well? I think we make a good team, don’t you?”

“The best,” Kandros agreed, remembering the ease with which they’d fought together. He smiled as well. “It’s a date, then.”

Sara leaned up as best she could, standing on her tiptoes, and pressed a kiss to the very bottom edge of Kandros’s mandible. She sauntered away, saying, “See you tomorrow, then…partner.”

Kandros smiled. He could get used to being called Sara’s partner.


End file.
